What Automatic Resource Management alternatives exist for Scala?

Question

I have seen many examples of ARM (automatic resource management) on the web for Scala. It seems to be a rite-of-passage to write one, though most look pretty much like one a

Answer 1

Here's James Iry solution using continuations:

// standard using block definition
def using[X <: {def close()}, A](resource : X)(f : X => A) = {
   try {
     f(resource)
   } finally {
     resource.close()
   }
}

// A DC version of 'using' 
def resource[X <: {def close()}, B](res : X) = shift(using[X, B](res))

// some sugar for reset
def withResources[A, C](x : => A @cps[A, C]) = reset{x}

Here are the solutions with and without continuations for comparison:

def copyFileCPS = using(new BufferedReader(new FileReader("test.txt"))) {
  reader => {
   using(new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter("test_copy.txt"))) {
      writer => {
        var line = reader.readLine
        var count = 0
        while (line != null) {
          count += 1
          writer.write(line)
          writer.newLine
          line = reader.readLine
        }
        count
      }
    }
  }
}

def copyFileDC = withResources {
  val reader = resource[BufferedReader,Int](new BufferedReader(new FileReader("test.txt")))
  val writer = resource[BufferedWriter,Int](new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter("test_copy.txt")))
  var line = reader.readLine
  var count = 0
  while(line != null) {
    count += 1
    writer write line
    writer.newLine
    line = reader.readLine
  }
  count
}

And here's Tiark Rompf's suggestion of improvement:

trait ContextType[B]
def forceContextType[B]: ContextType[B] = null

// A DC version of 'using'
def resource[X <: {def close()}, B: ContextType](res : X): X @cps[B,B] = shift(using[X, B](res))

// some sugar for reset
def withResources[A](x : => A @cps[A, A]) = reset{x}

// and now use our new lib
def copyFileDC = withResources {
 implicit val _ = forceContextType[Int]
 val reader = resource(new BufferedReader(new FileReader("test.txt")))
 val writer = resource(new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter("test_copy.txt")))
 var line = reader.readLine
 var count = 0
 while(line != null) {
   count += 1
   writer write line
   writer.newLine
   line = reader.readLine
 }
 count
}

Answer 2

For now Scala 2.13 has finally supported: try with resources by using Using :), Example:

val lines: Try[Seq[String]] =
  Using(new BufferedReader(new FileReader("file.txt"))) { reader =>
    Iterator.unfold(())(_ => Option(reader.readLine()).map(_ -> ())).toList
  }

or using Using.resource avoid Try

val lines: Seq[String] =
  Using.resource(new BufferedReader(new FileReader("file.txt"))) { reader =>
    Iterator.unfold(())(_ => Option(reader.readLine()).map(_ -> ())).toList
  }

You can find more examples from Using doc.

A utility for performing automatic resource management. It can be used to perform an operation using resources, after which it releases the resources in reverse order of their creation.

Answer 3

Daniel,

I've just recently deployed the scala-arm library for automatic resource management. You can find the documentation here: https://github.com/jsuereth/scala-arm/wiki

This library supports three styles of usage (currently):

1) Imperative/for-expression:

import resource._
for(input <- managed(new FileInputStream("test.txt")) {
// Code that uses the input as a FileInputStream
}

2) Monadic-style

import resource._
import java.io._
val lines = for { input <- managed(new FileInputStream("test.txt"))
                  val bufferedReader = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(input)) 
                  line <- makeBufferedReaderLineIterator(bufferedReader)
                } yield line.trim()
lines foreach println

3) Delimited Continuations-style

Here's an "echo" tcp server:

import java.io._
import util.continuations._
import resource._
def each_line_from(r : BufferedReader) : String @suspendable =
  shift { k =>
    var line = r.readLine
    while(line != null) {
      k(line)
      line = r.readLine
    }
  }
reset {
  val server = managed(new ServerSocket(8007)) !
  while(true) {
    // This reset is not needed, however the  below denotes a "flow" of execution that can be deferred.
    // One can envision an asynchronous execuction model that would support the exact same semantics as below.
    reset {
      val connection = managed(server.accept) !
      val output = managed(connection.getOutputStream) !
      val input = managed(connection.getInputStream) !
      val writer = new PrintWriter(new BufferedWriter(new OutputStreamWriter(output)))
      val reader = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(input))
      writer.println(each_line_from(reader))
      writer.flush()
    }
  }
}

The code makes uses of a Resource type-trait, so it's able to adapt to most resource types. It has a fallback to use structural typing against classes with either a close or dispose method. Please check out the documentation and let me know if you think of any handy features to add.